


Quick Touches

by StripySock



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Communication, M/M, Season/Series 08, Shaving, Trust, UST
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-18
Updated: 2013-02-18
Packaged: 2017-11-29 18:44:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,485
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/690225
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/StripySock/pseuds/StripySock
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dean volunteers to shave Sam the old fashioned way with a straight razor and a Man of Letters antique shaving kit. A realisation comes with it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Quick Touches

Sam's eyes are wide as they catch his in the mirror, like they're inhabiting a single breathless space between them, caught in this moment of time, and Dean almost leans his chin on Sam's head for a moment, stops just an inch away, runs a hand down his shoulder, firm and brief. "Trust me?" he asks, and it's half a question, and more than half an answer. Dean doesn't ask for things he knows he won't get, chance of rejection too harsh to take, flinching away from the fear of denial, of scorn. It's been a long time since he could ask that and get the answer he wants, and that he asks now is a step between them, a building block to even better things.

 

Sam tilts his head back, bares his neck and closes his eyes, surrenders to the darkness behind his eyelids for long seconds. When the hot towel descends, he breathes in deep and stifles the initial panic, the initial need to throw it off, to see. They are warded. Protected. Dean stands behind him, a silent presence and nothing is going to get past him. He calms his beating heart, doesn't let his hand twitch towards his belt, just inhales slowly, feels the hot water soak into the pores of his face, soften the bristles of his stubble a little. When it begins to go cold- swifter than he'd have thought, Dean whips it away, and a hand holds the angle of Sam's jaw, tilts his face a little upward once again, and he's not sure what comes next, doesn't know if he can bear the anticipation. His nerves are shot to shit these days, he knows that and he squeezes his eyes even tighter shut because all this is, is a shave.

 

Dean had asked if he wanted to try out the practically antique shaving kit he'd found tucked into the bathroom- elegant badger-hair shaving brushes, whisper-thin towels so buttery soft they were more like chamois leather than silk, a monogrammed straight razor, every accoutrement possible to get a cut throat shave, so close to the skin it was unreal, and Sam hadn't seen the harm, until he realised _he'd_ be in the chair, and Dean would be that close to his throat with a knife, and Jesus Christ that half terrified him, half thrilled him deep down. And it wasn't like Dean didn't have experience- Sam had noticed him appear clean shaved every single day they were here, so finely done it was like he never stubbled at all, and without a cut or a scratch to his name, but still something in him trembled at the thought. 

 

Dean had taught him to shave, way back when, chucked a razor at his head, stood with him in front of the mirror and demonstrated the basics, when Sam was a gawky teenager, and Dean was _just_ starting not to be, another thing that Dean had taught when John was gone, cheap plastic safety razors, Sam clumsy enough that he spent a week with bits of tissue stuck to his face before he got the knack.

 

Now the brush is touching his skin, whisper soft and fine, coated with some sweet smelling foam, whisked up in a little dish, and Dean had gone all out with this if he'd bought in shaving soap instead of the generic canned stuff they used from day to day, and it coats him from his cheekbones to his chin, and then Dean has what really amounts to a knife to his face, and the slow slide of metal across skin sends him prickling into awareness, nerves on fire as blood rushes to his face, dilates his pores, and still the smooth stern slide of the razor continues against his skin, stroking soft as a caress, an idle threat that holds him still and silent, as with long slow strokes, consummate infinite skill, Dean finishes first one cheek and then the other, and Sam thinks hazily that Dean has always been a thing of terror with steel in his grasp, can't explain the swell of feeling in his belly, like he's holding a breath too deep and tight, though his chest moves in and out with regular hitches. He holds it properly when Dean does his upper lip with quick little strokes like he's whittling away at something unseen, shaping something under his hands.

 

Then Dean's hands return with the badger brush, soft fibres saturated with soap, light as a feather on his skin, sending tiny flashes of sensation down his spine, and when he's coated again, the razor returns and sweeps under his chin and on his upper neck with finesse. It's been honed to a degree of sharpness that most blades never reach, and Sam shivers imperceptibly at the thought, stills when he remembers what that means. The smallest movement and he could regret it. The metal strokes lightly, tenderly against the delicate vulnerable skin of his neck, he doesn't even swallow as Dean does his work, meticulously like Sam is any other machine to be maintained and repaired, like under his hands he'll come apart and shine up well. He repeats the whole process again, from foam to shave, until he's closer than anything has ever been without slipping beneath the skin, and he's known objectively what Dean can do with those hands- how precise he can be, and how careful, but he's never had this kind of focus, this kind of attention turned on him before, and it's overwhelming. 

 

He's not sure how they got here, but he doesn't want to jeopardise this tiny fragile peace that they've built at so much cost. When the coldness of the cold towel hits his skin, he's shocked out of contemplation, until Dean removes it with a flourish, squeezes out some sandalwood scented aftershave, and rubs it in with the tips of his fingers, and whether it's how newly fresh and sensitive his skin feels- naked and bare, but he can barely take the pressure- it's too much against his face, and hell he's shaved hundreds of times and it's never felt quite like this- heated ends of Dean's fingers against his skin and he can't articulate exactly what he wants, only knows that it's something else, and his stomach lurches again as he brushes so close to what it might be, then shies away again. 

 

"Feel good?" Dean asks, and there's something in his eyes that Sam can't quite place, except that he thinks he's seen flashes of it on the rare occasions Dean cooks for him, or chucks him the keys so he can drive for once, and Sam traces his fingers over his own skin, can't believe how smooth it feels.

 

"Feels awesome," he admits, and stands up from the chair, stretches out limbs held in one place too long. His face felt colder than it usually did after a shave, and he couldn't resist touching it again, marveling at the weird sensation. "Yeah, this is kind of amazing," he said and grins at Dean. "Your turn," he says, and holds out his hand for the razor to dunk and clean in the sink, and Dean doesn't fight that for once, doesn't make excuses to duck away like he always does when Sam tries to extend care in return, just lies back and closes his eyes, and Sam gets to make Dean feel as good as he did, and it's not until he's dunking the razor in the warm water for a final sweep that Sam connects the languorous heaviness in his gut to the obvious cause, and the realisation makes him jerk, nick Dean just a little, the tiniest of cuts- just enough for soap to sting, and Dean to turn with an accusing glance, which softens when he catches Sam's eyes, like he understands what the hell this is, and Sam wishes he'd enlighten the class because he's still in the dark himself.

 

"Sammy," Dean says, murmurs it low like some sort of prayer, and Sam drops the razor on the floor, washes Dean clean of the rest of the soap with hands that come too close to shaking, wants to get out of there, wants to press closer, feel more and less at once, and he hasn't felt this in years- being pulled apart over something he wants far too much, and can't have at all, and he'd thought he'd squashed down deep beyond recall so many years ago. Then Dean is there, like he's always there, in front of him, worry already flooding his eyes and guilt squirming beneath that, like he's pushed Sam too far, broken too many boundaries already, and Sam can't resist this anymore, doesn't _want_ to. Runs his hand down Dean's newly smooth, damp skin, the mirror of his own in this as in so much, and leans helplessly forward for the kiss.

**Author's Note:**

> Feedback as always much appreciated.


End file.
